Climate negotiations: a warm-up to 2015

Aubagne, 4 November 2013 – Poland will be hosting the 19th Global Climate Change Conference (COP 19) from 11 to 22 November. As leader of the Climate and Development Committee of Coordination SUD, GERES is sending a 3-person delegation to Warsaw. Their role will be to monitor the negotiations and facilitate two round tables in preparation for the major conference in Paris in 2015 which should see the signature of a new global agreement.

The scientific element of the IPPC report revealed on 27 September has strengthened the conviction that human activities play a large part in global warming. Confidence in this assumption has risen from 90% in 2007 to 95% in 2013. The estimated scale of global warming has certainly been revised slightly downwards, but experts still expect to see a rise of between 1.5°C and 4.5°C by 2100 in relation to the end of the 20th century.

A minimum rise of 3°C is the most likely prospect and so well above the symbolic threshold of 2°C beyond which it is thought that climate disruption will become unmanageable. What should we make of this? We now have more efficient measuring and modelling tools. Projections have never been so accurate, winning consensus within the scientific community.

Armed with this new climate data, delegations from around the world will be meeting in Warsaw to make their voices heard throughout the 10-day negotiations. A disorganized mass of countries, whether developing, emergent or industrialized, will be coming with a whole range of different aspirations concerning the new climate framework that is to be adopted in Paris in 2015. GERES will be there from 15 to 21 November to monitor this diplomatic race against the clock and contribute to the debate.

Two round tables are to be organized:

The first will examine the role France, as host country in 2015, hopes to play in mobilizing civil society in developing countries.

The second will be devoted to “social carbon”: how can the mechanisms set up under the Kyoto Protocol be moved forward to take more account of social, health and environmental benefits?

The Warsaw Summit may look like just a warm-up to Paris 2015, but it must not be allowed to go to waste. Every meeting now counts in the push for signature of the future global climate agreement. Transcending the sum of individual interests will be no easy undertaking but GERES will be doing its bit this year, next year and in 2015.